Christmas in Japan

Merry Christmas everyone (well a day late at least)! Thought I would share with you a little bit about how the Japanese celebrate Christmas. First of all, yes, they do celebrate Christmas. It is the most secularized version of Christmas I have ever experienced. Mainly because most people here are Buddhist or Shintoist so the birth of a Christian figure is not really celebrated. It was all about Santa and the lights! I saw plenty of beautiful light displays during the month of December.

A giant tree and ornament in the Tokyo Dome area

A whole tunnel lined with snowflake lights

The decorations at my station :) I'll miss them when they are gone.

There were also decorations and sales all over the place at department stores. I was even able to get some great decorations from the one hundred yen store. I bought a small cute tree, some garland, a fake wearth of poinsettias and a window decoration.

My tree :D

One of the things that amused me greatly is that most of the cards are 3-D. They looked really cool!

A card from one of my students

On the actual day of Christmas, everything and everywhere was still open for business and most people seemed to just go about their days. Most people celebrate by giving their direct family (like mother, father, and siblings) a gift and then having a dinner from KFC finished off by some Christmas cake. That's right, Japanese people eat Kentucky Fried Chicken for Christmas. It's what they think that we do in the States. Apparently, KFC used to be one of the only places you could find fried chicken so all the foreigners would go there during the Christmas season just to get something familiar so other people soon started imitating them and a tradition was born. The KFC by my station has had a table outside of the store to pre-order your Christmas chicken for about a month now. No joke. Many other places have started to catch on and sell fried chicken for Christmas such as the convenience stores and other American chains like McDonalds. I personally had a chicken sandwich from McDonalds for lunch that had a special Christmas sauce since KFC was way to busy for my liking. A Christmas cake is pretty much a regular cake decorated for Christmas. It's a layer of cake then icing and strawberry filling and another layer of cake. I went on a mission to find one for myself. Lucky for me, my grocery store was selling it in small two piece containers so I grabbed one of those!

Hello Christmas cake! Oishii!

I had a pretty chill Christmas. On Christmas Eve, I made my way to Roppongi so I could go to midnight Mass at the Franciscan Mission. It wasn't actually at midnight since the trains stop running. So I made my way right after work and got there just in time to join the sing along 10 mins before 9 PM. Mass was over by 10:30 and I went home to sleep.

There's poinsettias in front of the altar: must be Christmas!!

Christmas morning, I woke up early to Skype with my family and watch as they opened my gifts. Then I got a nice surprise of being able to talk to my boyfriend for a good 2 and a half hours. From there, I grabbed my McDonalds and Christmas cake. Another nice surprise came my way a little bit later. One of my friends texted me and wanted to meet up. So we headed to Tokyo to eat, drink, and be merry on Christmas. We had a great time and my friend almost missed her last train home! Yikes! But everything worked out. I didn't get home until about 1 AM and knew I had to wake up again to Skype with my dad's side of the family so I quickly hit the sack. I got to Skype with them as well and watched them open their presents and they all sang to me <3

Singing!

It was a pretty good way to spend the holiday. I still missed my family and friends like crazy and even cried a little during Mass but I tried to make the best of it. At least, I got to have fried chicken and Christmas cake.

Mt. Takao hike

Sorry I haven't posted in a while! I've been busy, busy, busy! But, last week, I had the time to go on a hike up the closest mountain to Tokyo, Mt. Takao. I went with my Tokyo adventure club so it was a lot of fun. One of the things that initially drew me to this opportunity was that it was also a service opportunity. We weren't just hiking up the mountain, we were cleaning the mountain as well! Also, we collected donations to go towards the Tohoku earthquake relief. As soon as I saw that, I really wanted to go! What a great opportunity to be helpful to the community that I am living in!
I met the group at the train station by the mountain as it would have been out of my way to go to Shinjuku and then to the mountain. We found ourselves a partner and we were off! My partner and I ended up at the back of the group so we didn't get much trash to pick up :( But, we had a great time hiking up the mountain and admiring the trees. It is amazing to me how the trees still have leaves in December! Back home, there would be nothing left so I was really appreciating the view! The people who were hiking on the mountain were also very nice! People kept walking by and thanking us for our hard work.
It was an absolutely gorgeous day for a hike and we made it to the summit in no time. Since it was such a wonderful day, we were able to see clear across to Mt. Fuji. It was a stunning view!

The view

There's Mt. Fuji!

Me at the summit :D

We stopped here and had a picnic lunch. I just brought a sandwich, chips, and an orange. We then started to make our way down to measure which team collected the most trash. On the way down, we did some extreme trash collecting. I tried my hand at it going off the trail to retrieve a bottle. It was difficult and I got dirty but at least I tried! We also stopped at a temple on the way down where I rubbed the statue of an octopus for good luck. It was a very pleasant afternoon with nature!

I hope I get some good luck!

Going off trail a bit to get a bottle

The trash I collected

Thanksgiving!

I knew that this time of year it was going to be tough. The holidays are quickly rolling up on us and that makes me miss my family more than I can say. So much so that sometimes I get chocked up singing We Wish You a Merry Christmas during my toddler classes. Anyway, this last Thursday was Thanksgiving and I was wanting to celebrate in style! I was lucky enough to find some friends who let me join in their Thanksgiving feast! On the actual day of Thanksgiving, I made myself a super American dinner of BBQ chicken and Kraft mac and cheese.

YUMMY!

It was excellent but I knew that Sunday was the day of my celebration with friends so I anxiously awaited the day when I would not only have some good old fashioned American food but also good company to go along with it!
The day after Thanksgiving which was actually Thanksgiving evening for my family, I got to have a Skype session with the whole family and it made me feel like I was there even if I only got to be there for an hour :)

Hey there family!

Sunday finally rolled around and I was off to Shizuoka for some friends and food! It was about a 3 hour train ride since I took local trains and not a shinkansen (bullet train) but it had a great view!! I had to go through all of these mountains and even passed right by Mt. Fuji. I also lost my apartment key on the train ride over here but I shall leave that to another post...I had ridden the whole train ride with my homemade pumpkin cheesecake in hand and it arrived safely with me. We spent the next couple of hours getting dinner ready and having some drinks.

Some of the cooking action!

Everything came out great and tasted fantastic! It was a memorable meal :D

I bet you're jealous

my cheesecake!

I ate sooo much

We were all pretty stuffed by the end of the meal but we were satisfied! We stayed up until 1 AM just chatting and picking at left-over cheesecake. Great way to spend my first major holiday away from the family. Thanks ladies!!

Kamakura Trip!

I live about an hour and fifteen minutes away from the great historical city of Kamakura. I've been meaning to head over there for quite sometime now but Sunday was the first time that I actually got to visit. It was a great experience and I had a fantastic time!
The experience started as soon as I pulled into Fujisawa. From there, I took an old historical electric railline it was really cute and fun!

The train!

While on the train, I got my first glimpse of the sea since I arrived here months ago.

There it is!

My first stop was to go to Kotokuin Temple to see the Great Buddha of Kamakura. This bronze statue is the second largest Buddha statue in Japan. It was originally cast in 1252. I couldn't wait to get it in person. I also heard that Kamakura was very beautiful in the fall so I was looking forward to what the scenery around the statue would look like. It did not disappoint!

Me and the Buddha

The Buddha's slippers

The inside of the statue

After seeing the Great Buddha, I did some shopping for gifts. I also ended up getting some green tea and sweet potato ice cream. I was unsure of how it was going to taste but it was really good! I liked it a lot! W While I was getting the ice cream, the clerk asked me where I was from. I told him that I was American and he pointed towards a picture of President Obama outside of the store dated 11/14/2010. He smiled and told me, "President Obama, okay! Nice!" I smiled and told him that I was from Illinois which is where Obama is from as well and he nearly freaked out! It was so funny. He shouted "Sugoi!" and told the other cashiers that I was from Chicago in quick Japanese and they all shook their heads and agreed that it was very awesome. It was quite the fun little experience. I then headed to another temple on my way back to the train. It was Hasedera, a temple dedicated to the goddess Kannon. I adored this temple. It had beautiful gardens, a fantastic view, and awe inspiring statues. Oh, and an amazingly creepy sacred cave.

The gardens

The temple lit up at night. The colors in front of the temple change.

Sacred cave!

The inside of the cave

The fantastic view

 

It was a fabulous day of exploring which I REALLY needed after a rough week at work. Great way to turn the week around!

Food Spotlight: Fast Food

I'm not going to lie here: I LOVE having familiar fast food restaurants around here. Japanese people have an odd love for American fast food. As a result, I have a whole bunch of familiar chain restaurants around me. It's actually really comforting to know that when all else fails, I can walk to the McDonald's or go down to the Starbucks where they treat me like a celebrity (true story). They just love a good hamburger here really. Some restaurants by me include: McDonald's, Burger King, KFC, Denny's, Starbucks, Tully's Coffee, and even an Outback Steakhouse.

mmmmmm BK...

Of course, each of these offers unique items as well as the staples that we are used. This is what makes it so fun! Almost all of these restaurants have some kind of teriyaki burger or wasabi spiced burger or KFC even has soy sauce chicken (which is way gross in my opinion. Too much salt for me to handle). There are also some Japanese burger chains that are equally amazing such as Mos Burger and Freshness Burger. My personal favorite places to visit are Burger King and Freshness Burger. I love the hot chicken sandwich here. They taste like some one put some Asian Zing sauce from Buffalo Wild Wings on it. YUM! I go to Freshness Burger for some of the "stranger" items like a teriyaki chicken burger or the crab burger. Another thing I appreciate here is that no matter where you go, they bring you your fries or onion rings fresh. Yes, you have to wait a couple of minutes but it is well worth the taste boost. I truthfully end up eating this kind of fast food about once a week when I just need a taste food. It's at least a small culinary cure for homesickness.

Some good old fashioned KFC. Yes, that wrapper totally says Wa-fu chicken...

Achievement unlocked: Reading!

The day has finally come! I sat my butt down and studied hard and I finally know how to read some Japanese! You have no idea how much I as an adult took being able to read for granted. It was something I didn't even think about when I first moved here. I've been so frustrated that I could not do the simplest things like read a menu to figure out what I was eating or not knowing what kind of sauce I just bought at the grocery store. But, I finally conquered one of the Japanese reading/writing systems. I can now read katakana and I mean READ it. I didn't just memorize the symbols, I officially read a whole menu with no help from anyone :D It was an exciting moment for me. I'm clearly moving up in the world.

Here's a little bit of information about the Japanese writing systems. There are three different systems: katakana, hiragana, and kanji. I chose to learn katakana because it is used for "borrowed words" from other languages (namely English). This means that although I am struggling to learn Japanese, I can still understand the words I am reading because they are words like kohi (coffee) or hamubaga (hamburger) or rate (latte). Hiragana is kind of like the basic alphabet. It covers all of the basic sounds in Japanese and uses it to form words. This is taught to children before they can read kanji. I hope to conquer this next...The last and most complicated of the symbols is kanji. These are symbols derived from Chinese that represent many words and sounds. I actually have learned about 50 or so kanji from my day to day interactions. Things like "water", "day", "month", "book", or even the names of some local cities from the trains have all been burned into my brain as I see them at least one a week. I hope I can absorb more and would like to know at least 200 or so kanji before I leave.

Student Stories: that CRAZY baby...

I teach a wide range of age starting with 6 month olds (I only have one). This is a story of one of my babies. He's about a year and a half old and he is CRAZY. He climbs all over his mother, runs around screeching and babbling, touches everything. His poor mother always looks so tired. One of the funniest thing that he does in his fits of temporary insanity is runs into walls. We will be in the middle of a lesson and he will jump out of his mother's lap and runs straight into the wall while screaming. The kicker is that EVERY time he does this, he looks surprised that it hurts. I'm pretty sure most people already learned by a year and a half that slamming yourself into walls hurts. Not this kid. It's a shock every time. His mom and I are hoping that he learns some basic physics one day soon...

Food Spotlight: Okonomiyaki

Okonomiyaki is a savory dinner pancake. What makes it so fun is you cook it at your table. You also get to pick what ingredients you want in it and, get this, you have to pick the consistency. There's a solid one and a kind of runny pancake. After you pick that out, the batter comes out and you cook it! You get little cooking utensils to flip it and everything.

Cooking it up!

Flip!

Once it's all done cooking, you cut it up into fourths and then add some sauces. There's mayonnaise, fish flakes, and seaweed. At least you can pick what you want. I totally skipped out on the fish flakes...

Yummy!! (Oishii!!)

Student Stories: He has a catchphrase

Let me introduce another new segment! I've been meaning to put up some funny lost in translation/student moments from my experience teaching in Japan. Please enjoy the first installment of Student Stories featuring one of my favorite kids!

I have a student who on a weekly basis makes me nearly die laughing. He is a super fun and energetic kid in a small class (just him and a little girl). I think he wants to be an entertainer when he grows up because he is always trying to make people laugh and he has something every good Japanese comedian needs: a catchphrase. I kid you not. It's hilarious. He adds "baby" to the end of the most random sentences. Did I mention he's like 6 yrs old? Precious.
It started out as "Oh no, baby!" when he was first in class with me. Recently it has evolved. Here are my favorite new catchphrases from him:
~We sing a transitional song that basically just repeats the question "What's next?" four times. This was his response last week. "I don't know, baby. What's next?" I nearly died.
~ I asked him, "How are you?" He paused, smiled and replied "I'm happy, baby."
~We recently learned some phrases and vocabulary about body parts and injuries. He changed every phrase to "Oh baby! I hurt my fingers."
~He recently picked up from me the phrase "Winner!" which I will sometimes proclaim after a game. When he wins, he now yells "Winner, baby!", takes a victory lap, and then asks for a high five. The other girl in the class thinks it is hilarious and has now let him start winning games.
This is my life. Love this kid.

Food spotlight: Bento box lunches!

One of the many highlights of living in Japan is the FANTASTIC food! I've been meaning to start a segment on some of the more traditional and unique foods that I am in love with so let the fun begin!
My favorite thing to do for lunch here is to go across the street to the new 7-11 and buy myself a bento box lunch.

SO CONVENIENT! I adore 7-11s here. I'll gush about convenience stores in a new post soon, I promise!

Bento boxes are traditional style Japanese lunch boxes. They generally have some rice and assorted meats and pickles such as fried pork or a cute little hamburger patty. I also love the little sushi boxes!

Some sushi and unagi (eel)-It's delicious!!

They warm it up for you as soon as you buy it which is amazingly nice to have a warm lunch despite not having a microwave in the office.
I also recently bought my own little bento box and have been trying to make my own lunches. They taste delicious but are not pretty at all.

Lookie what I made!

Part of the culture is to make the bento's cute or at least appealing. Mine are never such lol. Normally people at least have plastic containers to separate all of the aspects of the lunch. I bought my bento box at the Daiso (100 yen store) so basically it is not big enough to fit the containers. Oh well, I wish my bentos looked like this...

What a good and creative bento box looks like lol

 

Photo credit: http://blog.modes4u.com/products/cute-kawaii-bento-boxes.html

 I'll keep working at it. Who knows, maybe one day I'll make some super cute bento box lunches!

Japanese Style BBQ

I had a fun weekend this weekend! A part of that weekend was going to a Japanese style BBQ on Monday. There were some fun differences that I really enjoyed experiencing. We had the BBQ next to the river in a town about 35 mins from my apartment. I didn't realize how popular of an activity this was! There were at least 15 other groups around the area that we were in!
Of course, the major difference here was the food that we ate. At a traditional American BBQ, we have hamburgers, hot dogs, and maybe some chicken sandwiches or bratwurst. Here, the main dish was fish, as I expected. Everyone shared the same big fish.

Cleaning and gutting the fish

Grilling that bad boy up

We also had yakisoba (fried noodles) as well as various meats and veggies. It was great. We ate all day, literally. I arrived at 12:30 and left at 6:30 and the grill was never cold. It was really cool. We cooked a lot of different foods and everyone had a little bit of everything. Not many people there spoke English so it was an adventure in and of itself just to try communicating with some new people. Still, I did it! It was a great time with some amazing people and food!

Shizuoka and Hakone weekend!

This weekend, I took a trip with the adventure club Tokyo Gaijins. Our tour schedule got changed many a times due to unforeseen circumstances but we powered through it and had a good time.
We started our trip by taking a hike to go these seven famous waterfalls. Here is where some of the trouble started. There was a huge typhoon that just passed through here a couple of weeks ago. There was still damage that the grounds staff had to clear up, so two of the waterfalls were still off limits. We still saw five of the waterfalls and had a picnic lunch while sitting and enjoying the view.

The legend is if you can throw a stone and it stays on this sacred rock, you will have good luck for the rest of your life. I failed...

It was so beautiful

After the hike, we were supposed to go to a traditional Japanese onsen (hot spring). However, we ran into two problems. First, the original onsen was closed due to typhoon damage. At the second onsen that we were supposed to go to a maintenance man dropped a light bulb into the spring and there was glass everywhere. Needless to say, that onsen was out.
We decided to head up to Hakone and find an onsen there to relax at. I was determined to visit one as this was one of the main reasons I signed up for the trip.
We started the Hakone trip by traveling up to the mountains on a literally spiraled road.

Once there, we did a little sight seeing. My group visited a shinto shrine in the area which was beautiful! It was dedicated to the lake.

Sacred tree

My favorite part of this photo is the Japanese couple admiring the lake.

After that, we went farther up into the mountains to see some sulfur pots and natural springs. As expected, it was pretty smelly but still cool. My favorite part was the view of the town and Mt. Fuji.

Wow, just stunning.

That's Mt. Fuji in the distance.

Then came the part of the trip that I had been both dreading and looking forward to, it was time to go to the onsen. Now, something to understand about traditional Japanese hot springs is that there are two different hot springs for ladies and gentleman because you go into the hot springs totally naked...quite a daunting
idea to me...I was determined to do it at least once while I was here though. At first, I was a bit embarrass ed because I had never done anything like this before. But the others were really supportive and coaxed me out of the dressing room. Soon, I was in the natural hot spring and relaxing. We knew it was a natural hot spring because there are trace amounts of sulfur which started turning my skin yellow! I ended up loving it so I'm beyond happy I gave it a try!
After the relaxing onsen, we drove home. I was so relaxed that I slept the whole way home. All in all it was a fun trip. I got to meet some new people and saw some great sights.

The group. The photographer told us to do a muscle man pose but apparently I was the only one who got the memo lol